[PATCH 1/8] perf cs-etm: Don't flush when packet_queue fills up

[James Clark]

cs_etm__flush(), like cs_etm__sample() is an operation that generates a
sample and then swaps the current with the previous packet. Calling
flush after processing the queues results in two swaps which corrupts
the next sample. Therefore it wasn't appropriate to call flush here so
remove it.

Flushing is still done on a discontinuity to explicitly clear the last
branch buffer, but when the packet_queue fills up before reaching a
timestamp, that's not a discontinuity and the call to
cs_etm__process_traceid_queue() already generated samples and drained
the buffers correctly.

This is visible by looking for a branch that has the same target as the
previous branch and the following source is before the address of the
last target, which is impossible as execution would have had to have
gone backwards:

  ffff800080849d40 _find_next_and_bit+0x78 => ffff80008011cadc update_sg_lb_stats+0x94
   (packet_queue fills here before a timestamp, resulting in a flush and
    branch target ffff80008011cadc is duplicated.)
  ffff80008011cb1c update_sg_lb_stats+0xd4 => ffff80008011cadc update_sg_lb_stats+0x94
  ffff8000801117c4 cpu_util+0x24 => ffff8000801117d4 cpu_util+0x34

After removing the flush the correct branch target is used for the
second sample, and ffff8000801117c4 is no longer before the previous
address:

  ffff800080849d40 _find_next_and_bit+0x78 => ffff80008011cadc update_sg_lb_stats+0x94
  ffff80008011cb1c update_sg_lb_stats+0xd4 => ffff8000801117a0 cpu_util+0x0
  ffff8000801117c4 cpu_util+0x24 => ffff8000801117d4 cpu_util+0x34

Fixes: 21fe8dc1191a ("perf cs-etm: Add support for CPU-wide trace scenarios")
Reported-by: Ganapatrao Kulkarni <gankulkarni@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Closes: https://lore.kernel.org/all/20240719092619.274730-1-gankulkarni@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx/
Signed-off-by: James Clark <james.clark@xxxxxxxxxx>
---
 tools/perf/util/cs-etm.c | 6 ------
 1 file changed, 6 deletions(-)

diff --git a/tools/perf/util/cs-etm.c b/tools/perf/util/cs-etm.c
index 90f32f327b9b..602e791ff5ba 100644
--- a/tools/perf/util/cs-etm.c
+++ b/tools/perf/util/cs-etm.c
@@ -2490,12 +2490,6 @@ static void cs_etm__clear_all_traceid_queues(struct cs_etm_queue *etmq)
 
 		/* Ignore return value */
 		cs_etm__process_traceid_queue(etmq, tidq);
-
-		/*
-		 * Generate an instruction sample with the remaining
-		 * branchstack entries.
-		 */
-		cs_etm__flush(etmq, tidq);
 	}
 }
 
-- 
2.34.1